SUNDAY

My first born, fairest child is 93 million miles away,

Anna The Good, who wants, first, to go to church,

Who wants, next, to rest like the Lord of Creation,

DingDong, in the mess of her beautiful eyes.

Her father, McMullen The Wise, scares her, his beard

Looks like the torn tangle of her mind. At table

She will not eat nor drink unless the wine

Is poured, the bread broken. How to resurrect

Her childishness, lead her back to the backyard

Where, one Sunday, on the 4th of July, five years old,

She danced, a sunsparkle, fire-sparklers dripping from her hands.

Tense she is now and waiting,

Seven years old of debate, will-she, nill-she.

She wants incest, I guess, with her father

And he, a master of transformation, speaks

An oracle: "Years from now, when you marry,

Think not of me, grave-gone or weary, but clasp

In your arms some beauty who looks like me,

Who will say a poem for your daughter, a poem

That is fair and wise and good and gay."